Handmade student and professional oboe reeds

A.Lakota Professional Oboe Reeds

A Handmade, professional oboe reed, made to be well balanced in all registers with a beautiful rich resonant tone. Made on high-quality, thin-walled brass staples with synthetic cork. Made with high-quality hand select cane.

I currently use a Mack++ shape on these professional reeds. The shape is medium width and works well with my gouge and style of reed. I have been using this shape for 5 years so I am well accustomed to the tendencies. I feel it has a beautiful rich sound without sacrificing stability. It provides good intonation and articulation in all registers, for players with a moderately loose embouchure.

finished reeds are around 70mm

All A.Lakota professional oboe reeds are made over the course of 5-7 cycles of soaking and drying. This ensures that the reeds are stable when they reach you.

Product Description

My A.Lakota professional oboe reeds are made with a focus on function first and then finished to have a full resonant sound. I make all professional oboe reeds by hand, using traditional methods. I make reeds that play comfortable for me, so the Medium is what works well for me, soft is a little less resistant than what I may play myself and the hard is more resistant than what I would like. I aim to make very comfortable playing professional oboe reeds for myself and hope customers will benefit from my journey to find what works well.

Comparatively, to other reeds on the market, I find my professional oboe reeds to be slightly less resistant with a thinner tip and more removed from the windows just behind the heart. I aim to get as complex of a tone as possible with overtones throughout the sound. I like reeds to vibrate freely without controlling them too much with my embouchure.

Hard reeds are less finished in my opinion so if you have a particular way you like to finish your reeds you may consider trying the hard professional oboe reeds.

If every oboe reed you buy seems very hard to play you may try the medium or soft professional oboe reeds. I suggest starting with the Medium if you are a new customer.

I try to be as consistent with my classifications of the hardness, but I do not have a tool to measure to the qualities. It should also be noted that I am making reeds in Massachuessets where the climate changes regularly, and with that reeds can act differently in different climates. I welcome your feedback about how the reeds are working in any given season when you receive them so if things seem to change with the reeds you receive from season to season please let me know. I aim to make a great products no matter where my customers live, and this information allows me to be a better oboe reed maker.

Additional Information

Hardness

Soft, Medium, Hard

Brand

A.Lakota Reeds

2 reviews for A.Lakota Professional Oboe Reeds

5 out of 5

Julia – :

I’ve been playing on these reeds for a while now. Aaron takes great consideration when structuring reeds for optimal presence of overtones and I have rarely had to adjust them for intonation — usually an issue with compatibility with my oboe, not an issue with the reed itself. As a music educator and occasional professional oboist, my performance venues and ensembles vary greatly. The reeds I get from Aaron are durable and have provided an array of timbres when requested– he’s capable of creating mellow, mild reeds which I typically use for solo/liturgical settings and brighter, more resonant reeds which I use for cases in which I need to cut across an ensemble. I’m grateful for the amount of care Aaron takes to make sure his reeds are absolutely ready for the consumer and, six years into buying reeds from A. Lakota Reeds, have never received one that leaks. I highly recommend this option to intermediate, advanced, and professional musicians.

5 out of 5

Rebecca Anthony – :

I have just recently started purchasing reed from Aaron. My students have also been ordering reeds from him. He takes great care to make sure he selects the right reed for each individual musician. He adjusts his reeds to the exact needs of his customers. He is careful to make each reed vibrant with the appropriate resistance level for students of all ability levels. Aaron is always easy to get in touch with when the weather changes and need minor adjustments made. I have never received a reed that was not performance quality.